August 19-20, 2006 Shelby Co, Memphis-TN Mike Todd and I started out early Saturday looking for the Wood Storks in Frayser. There were none at the location where 13 were seen on Friday. We searched the surrounding area and finally Mike spotted one perched high in a cypress tree off Watkins Road at the Loosahatchie River. Mike got some knock out photos of the bird and I was able to flag down Jay Walko as he drove by for a look at his Lifer Stork. Our First lucky stroke of the weekend. Mississippi Kites were everywhere we looked as we traveled from one end of town to the other. We had kites in view at 11 of our first 12 stops over a 20 mile run with more seen on Sunday. We met the Nashville group at the pits late Saturday and shared a lot of birds in various plumage's and ages but far fewer than expected species for this time of the year. The pits produced only nine species with the Mississippi River adding two on Saturday. We added another species on Sunday. Only 12 Wind Bird species for the weekend?? Early Sunday morning, Mike and I were waiting for the Nashville group to arrive at the pits and driving in they flushed an Upland Sandpiper that flew right over us just calling its head off. Our Second lucky stroke of the weekend. Unfortunately, their group never knew the bird was anywhere around. Uplands are hard to flush or see in the fall but are always lurking in the pigweed. Mike and I located and photographed a partially albinistic Least Sandpiper. This bird's back was sprinkled with large white feathers. After searching through the thousands of Pectoral and Least Sandpipers, we started toward Mud Island. Along the road out we had lots of luck with Yellow-crowned Night-Herons, Turkeys and other species and last but NOT LEAST, we picked up 2 Broad-winged Hawks, one of which (an immature) turned out to be the rare dark morph of this species. The only other one I have ever seen was a bird years ago at the pits, that I shared with Gene Knight. Lucky stroke number THREE! At Mud Island there were 30 plus Black Terns, lots of Least and 1 or 2 Caspian Terns. On the Island were the only Black-necked Stilts seen for the weekend plus a few Pectoral, Spotted and Killdeer. Mike and I had a first of season Wilson's Snipe there on Saturday. We had a good raptor weekend with Red-tails, Red-shouldered, Cooper's and Kestrels all perched for scope views and at least 3 Broad-wings circling. The Mississippi Kites put on a great flying show right over our heads Sunday at the north end of Mud Island. Later, we were lucky again in finding the hybrid Western Kingbird/Scissor-tailed young and Mom (Thanks to Jan). Everyone got to see the full bright yellow breast and belly plus the wide black forked tails on the mixed up young. It is unusual here for these birds to hang around very long after fledging. After much searching through flocks of Great Egrets, a concentration of Snowy Egrets and one immature Little Blue, we called it quits looking for the elusive Wood Storks and the Nashville group headed for home. Over all, a very productive weekend with good company and some super birds. Good Birding !!! Jeff R. Wilson / TLBA 6298 Memphis-Arlington Road Bartlett, TN 38135 =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to SIGN YOUR MESSAGE with first and last name, CITY (TOWN) and state abbreviation. You are also required to list the COUNTY in which the birds you report were seen. The actual DATE OF OBSERVATION should appear in the first paragraph. _____________________________________________________________ To post to this mailing list, simply send email to: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx _____________________________________________________________ To unsubscribe, send email to: tn-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. ______________________________________________________________ TN-Bird Net is owned by the Tennessee Ornithological Society Neither the society(TOS) nor its moderator(s) endorse the views or opinions expressed by the members of this discussion group. Moderator: Wallace Coffey, Bristol, TN wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ------------------------------ Assistant Moderator Andy Jones Cleveland, OH ------------------------------- Assistant Moderator Dave Worley Rosedale, VA __________________________________________________________ Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society web site at http://www.tnbirds.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ARCHIVES TN-Bird Net Archives at //www.freelists.org/archives/tn-bird/ EXCELLENT MAP RESOURCES Topographical Maps located at http://topozone.com/find.asp Tenn.Counties Map at http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/states/tennessee3.gif Aerial photos to complement google maps http://local.live.com _____________________________________________________________